Monigote or Mono (singular in both cases) are just semi-derisive terms we used as kids in Mexico to refer to our action figures ; )

I hold nostalgic memories for those toys I have from my childhood, but I have a very easy-going attitude towards collecting, meaninga) I don't care only for vintage and I reckon the vintage line came up with some fugly figures. The attachment I have for them is –as I stated before– mostly sentimental. So if this thread belongs in other sub-forum, please feel free to move it; it will be fine with me.b) Even though I would like to have all my figures complete with original accesories, I am OK if some of them don't have their blasters anymore. If I stumble with the opportunity of getting them at a fair price, great; but if I don't, then that's also OK.c) I am not into completing a particular focus. I only buy the figures which are nice-looking to me and which I find at a nice price. I have no desire for paying hundreds of dollars for "rare" figures. There might be figures I would like to own but they are mostly expensive and I am OK with the fact of knowing that I might never have them. I also do not care that much for owning variations. I respect people who love to own all the subtly-differentiated figures they can get their hands on but that's not for me.d) I just LOVE taking pictures of them. Not action stances but a more catalogue-esque approach to the photos. I think photographing them is the secondary pleasure I derive after getting them.e) I don't like figures in boxes. I know many people strive for them but that's not for me. I love to manipulate the figures: they are nice toys for me, not "collector's items" in a snotty sense. For me, a package is just that: a package. I store them but not treasure them. For many years as a kid I stored my Lilí packaging but it came one time when I decided to throw them out because they were becoming too much of a bulk although yes, I do regret that now ; ) AFA-graded stuff? Not for me. I don't like to see plastic figures encased in plastic.f) I don't preserve my figures nor collect with an interest of future economic value.g) I don't care that much for the movies. I just love the figures. : )

I will be posting now and then some pictures of my collection.

This is the first one I got. An uncle of mine was traveling a lot to the U.S. for job reasons now and then and my mom, on our Reyes Magos (Three Wise Men) celebration (akin to US's Santa Claus bringing gifts, but on January the 6th.) asked him just to bring along some toys. We were not wealthy; my mom worked as a secretary but she somehow managed to pay for some stuff. My uncle (unbeknownst to me due to the magic guise of the Reyes Magos) got me Han Solo and a Snowspeeder and I was in immediate awe on that January morning in 1981 (?). Our national toy production back then had neither the same quality nor the same action features (lights, sounds, etc), so these toys had some arresting qualities to them which drove me nuts. And last but not least, the Snowspeeder was accompanied by a catalogue, which I gawked at for hours, just drooling over the prospect of having more of the stuff shown in it. Regrettably, I had no further access to US-produced SW toys for the rest of my childhood. Luckily, Lilí-Ledy came to the rescue but that is another story...

I still keep the original weapon. My Snowspeeder has got now a repro harpoon. One of the things I remember the most about playing with it is just flying the spaceship very near my eye level, peeping sideways through the cockpit and imagining I watching my room flying below from inside.

At some point I retouched Han's hair and eyebrows with acryllic paint.

Due to the fact that I liked to be able to look at my Snowspeeder from my bed, I put it on top of a piece of furniture, near a window, which resulted in yellowed plastic with the passing of the years but it is one of my most treasured toys still...

Later on (I can't recall how long afterwards it was), I went to the store along with my cousins and they bought some hot-flavoured powder sweets (mainly, chili powder plus sugar). I liked the container it came in and I kept it, minus the cap. From a mom-and-pop's shop to a spaceship crew, it shared many interstellar adventures with mr. Solo.

Well, the eighties was a terrible decade –financially-wise– for Mexico. The dollar parity to the Mexican peso just went up on a constant basis. Even as a kid it was notorious how every couple or months or so almost everything, from rice to higher-line commodities just costed more. Inflation was overwhelming for grown-ups and that reflected on us getting either fewer stuff or just cheaper stuff. That's one of the reasons (I think) Mexican collectors as a whole don't tend to despise reproduction accesories and why was there such a huge production of bootlegs in that decade. We just grew surrounded by that stuff. Not on the big supermarkets, but on the street ones. It was common to fill piñatas with fruit, candy and cheap plastic toys; to go to any street market and winning small plastic or painted ceramic toys by playing some games which involved darts or BB-Gun pellets or marbles. Those toys could also be found at small stationery or toy shops scattered across the city. Those can still be found nowadays, though naturally with other toy lines.

I'd say we were middle class. I was an only child, so I guess that made finances easier for my mom. Along the year, she would bring me cheap knock-offs of any conceivable monster, animal or soldier on her way from her job*, but now and then I could get some nicer toys, mostly on December (my birthday and Christmas) and January. On the "top-shelves" of boys' toys one could find the Spanish-conceived Madelman, which were awesome 7-inch action figures with enormous detail put into them, the Kid Acero (Spanish for Kid Steel) stuff (which were the Big Jim figures packed for the Mexican market) and the Star Wars figures. At least the ones I remember.

*such as these Galaxy Laser Team bootleg figures, just sold inside a plastic bag with some coarsely-printed and stapled carton depicting the figures inside (or other figures, who cared) under any name the vendor imagined. ; )

The available figure choices in the Star Wars catalogues were nice to look at, but sadly as a kid I never knew most of them would not be sold in my country. Lilí-Ledy was the one distributing the Kenner figures but I was at the time unaware of the Imperio lines. I don't even know if they were distributed in my city or just in Mexico City (a two hour-trip from my place). The first Lilí figure I got was this Luke. The big hole in his shoulder, regrettably, was a recent accident from two or three years ago. I could not find back the missing piece.[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

As a kid I used to bring all my monigotes to a cousin's house: his mother had some big red volcanic-looking stones in the middle of her garden and we just moved them around to create caves for our playing needs. I don't know if Luke's weapons were devoured back then by some cave creature. All I know is that this thing (I don't know the name in English) served beautifully as a replacement for his yellow sword for many, many years. In fact, this is the picture is the very same I used back then. Solo and Arturito were reunited with the saga's hero, even though he didn't quite resemble the actor in the movies and looked more like an easy-going, bland chap. Both seats of the Snowspeeder were now occupied. : )

One of the craziest things we could get our hands on as kids were rubber animals. Tarantules, dinosaurs, sharks, skeletons... you name it. They were typically sold at the downtown, people just laying plastic sheets on the floor with all their merchandise. The crazy thing were not the actual figures, but their eyes. They were pins stuck inside the rubber. One could easily (and dangerously) pull them out of the figure... or pinch one's fingers with them : D They were adorned with some plastic beads to simulate eye colour. But of course there was no age restriction for their use and no governmental control over their safety risks in general, so perhaps accidents akin to the infamous Galactica firing rockets were much more common in Mexico with this kind of toys.

I had four dinosaurs of this type: a grey triceratops, an orange dimetrodon and two tyranossauruses (is that the plural form?), but this guy is the only survivor. Regrettably at some point I took out its eyes because they interfered with the ability of sticking one's fingers down his throat. You could insert the whole finger inside and that added to its play value : D You can see the little holes in which they were inserted, though, and some extra holes in the chest, belly and legs where I pricked him with the same eye-pins.